Medicine is a service industry, the product of which is health care, and its practitioners deserve remuneration. But to some, the notion of medicine as a road to personal wealth is an example of free-market economics gone awry.
AMA J Ethics. 2015;17(8):780-786. doi:
10.1001/journalofethics.2015.17.8.msoc1-1508.
Dr Kimberly A. Singletary joins Ethics Talk to discuss her article, coauthored with Dr Marshall H. Chin: “What Should Antiracist Payment Reform Look Like?”
Learn about the development of the systems for delivery and reimbursement of health care in the U.S. from the unregulated free-market state in 1908 to the complex, highly managed state in which it exists in 2008.
Industry sponsorship of continuing medical education is controversial. A standard to adhere to is that before accepting any industry-sponsored education or incentive, a physician should form an independent evaluation of the product.
To be a useful tool for assessing quality of physician care, pay-for-performance must be designed to include process measures and to not penalize physicians for treating patients with difficult-to-manage conditions.
State laws often require physicians to report suspected abuse and assault, creating a dilemma for physicians who must not only treat the injured patient but act as an informant to police.
Physicians should recognize the influence that small gift-giving has on prescribing patterns and consequently interactions between pharmaceutical representatives and medical students and residents should be limited.